What We'd Like to See on the Episode III DVD

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Two or three discs? Multiple commentaries? Documentaries? Our thoughts inside.

By Chris Carle

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away Star Wars came onto the scene, and with it, a new form of cinema. One could argue that without George Lucas' magnum opus, the world of movies, toys and entertainment would have evolved much differently. Who knows when blockbusters would have arrived, when technology would have moved forward, or even how movies would look or sound now?

Indeed, it is not too much of a stretch to wonder where we would be in terms of home video formats without this series. No matter how one feels about the Star Wars films, their effect on technology and cutting-edge delivery on all formats has been virtually unparalleled.

With the release of Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom Menace, Star Wars Episode II Attack of the Clones and more recently, the Star Wars Trilogy, fans of the DVD format have been treated to some of the most technologically superior discs on the market, and the special features have been some of the most engrossing and well-produced ever included.

Fresh off a screening of Episode III, we decided to put together a wish list of what we'd like to see from the Revenge of the Sith DVD. This is by no means a preview of things that will actually appear on the disc; in fact, it's similar to the sandbox conversations we all had as kids regarding Star Wars&#Array; the ones that started with "You know what would be cool?"

Video Let's get rid of all the obvious stuff right away. Like Episodes I&II before it, Episode III needs a brilliant transfer. Revenge of the Sith dwarves its predecessors in terms of visual effects and pure beauty in each frame, so anything less than a pristine, direct-from-digital transfer would be a sin. But, of course everyone in the galaxy (near or far) knows this, so it would be shocking if the disc delivered anything other than a "10" in terms of visual quality.

Audio Same is true of the audio. Although the film does not have anything quite as amazing as the Seismic Charges from Episode II, the overall mix and score are wonderful. There are so many explosions, gun battles and lightsaber duels in III that any home system is going to get a workout. Luckily, these are the folks who invented THX sound, so there should be no worries here.

To be more specific, here are the formats we'd like to see supported: Dolby Digital EX and DTS-ES Discrete 6.1. Jedi-wanna-bes can dream, can't they? In addition, if deleted scenes are included, we'd like to see them fully produced in at least one multi-channel format.